With ever-increasing consumer expectations and pressure, a disconnected customer journey exposes businesses and puts them at danger of losing customers. Before turning their attention to the consumer, sales and marketing teams must establish a trusting relationship and a close working relationship among themselves, taking the time to learn how one function compliments the other.
The ultimate revenue-generating power duo in the corporate world is sales and marketing. Despite their many parallels and distinctions, they are inextricably linked. However, business performance is often hampered by gaps and misalignment between sales and marketing departments.
Because both teams have the same goal of increasing sales and revenue from new and existing customers, they should be in sync and collaborate on a regular basis. Therefore, it’s past time for sales and marketing teams to find common ground for a greater good.
Some of the key factors behind the dichotomy are poor communication between the two teams, being incentivized by different goals, and not sharing data. But, business leaders believe they have done everything they can to support the two business functions, exacerbating the problem. Budgets for advertising and marketing collateral have been increased, individual goals have been established, and the skilled professionals have been hired. However, without properly integrating the two and establishing a seamless customer journey, their company will be unable to fulfil its goals.
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An integrated strategy, a clear tunnel for leads and a holistic data approach helps alleviate the financial and productivity losses caused by misalignment between sales and marketing. So, how does one go about accomplishing this?
Clearly defined brand and target
Before the customer begins their journey, marketing and sales must agree on a consistent brand that can be shared between the two departments. According to a 2020 LinkedIn study titled “Moments of Trust,” 97 percent of sales and marketing professionals struggle with content and messaging alignment. Marketing content that is too product-driven without a focus on the issue the customer is attempting to solve, and marketing content that does not assist the consumer along their buying process are all common issues.
Because only a tiny fraction of businesses have fully integrated marketing and sales KPIs, it’s critical that the two work together to define a target group and create a revenue channel, as well as share message to ensure consistency across the organization.
To connect these two funnels, marketing and sales teams should schedule frequent meetings to keep on track with their common objectives and communicate work plans, accomplishments, and roadblocks. To create an impactful, streamlined journey for the customer, successful businesses ensure that both teams have a say in strategy planning, generating content and setting KPIs.
Cross-siloed systems
The teams should identify and eliminate any blind spots once the foundations have been laid. Inconsistencies in the being data can frequently be narrowed down as a data-driven problem, causing misalignment between sales and marketing.
Despite the fact that data silos appear to be daunting, an advanced CRM system can serve as a functional bridge that connects the two teams. The objective is to gather all accessible consumer data in one location and use technology to discover and fill any gaps.
Bridging sales and marketing data sets will provide a complete, 360-degree perspective of the consumer, allowing both teams to make critical strategic and tactical decisions.
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Process for generating leads
Along with implementing a sophisticated system, companies should ensure that the two funnels are eliminated from an outsider’s perspective and that a clear protocol for engaging with leads is established.
According to the LinkedIn report, nine out of ten sales and marketing professionals feel their process, strategy, content, and culture are all out of sync. Furthermore, 98% of sellers and marketers believe this will have a negative impact on their business and customers.
While the process does not have to be linear, everything should be brought back to a unified experience, starting with awareness at the beginning of the customer journey and ending with brand loyalty. Sales teams will be able to use marketing data obtained about a prospect and effortlessly convert leads into sales prospects with an interwoven workflow between the two business functions.
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